The overriding objective of these designated professionals is to quickly enable people to get back to work and ensure the viability, continuity and recovery of economic life for public and private-sector organizations. It is believed that in a major event there might be as many as 3 to 10 second responders for every first responder. Coordinating the activities of all second responders is a communications intensive activity usually the responsibility of the on-site Incident Commander. The guidelines and responsibilities of the Incident Commander are described in the U.S. Federal Emergency Management AgencyNational Incident Management System (NIMS) training program.[1]

Because identifying and empowering second responders helps make the difference between lingering disruption and the necessary and timely restoration of daily life, many state and local governments are adopting the unique “second responder” identification protocol known as the Corporate Emergency Access System (CEAS).